May be you want to finish campus, get a job and save part of the salary to get some capital so that you can venture into business. Or perhaps you want to work with the best companies in the world so that you can scale up your skills and boost your exposure.
Whichever the case,
here are some basic life rules that you need to break if you
want to find your dream job.
#RULE 1: Waiting
till you graduate to apply for jobs
Don’t wait till you’re
thrown out of your hostel room in school to start applying for a job. Start
your job search early using your provisional results transcript.
Going by the Kenyan
academic calendar, most students graduate starting the month of May onwards. If
we use basic math rules here, we can say that the probability of getting your
CV read by the human resource manager is higher during the months of February
to April than from May to December.
Why? You might want to
ask…with more and more graduates joining the “job-search caravan”, it only
means that more CVs are being sent out per job post.
The more applicants there are per job post, the slimmer your chances of being
noticed by the employers!
#Rule 2:
Underestimating the power of Social Media
Don’t take social
media for granted.
So, how can you use
the power of social media positively? Follow these 4 job tips:
Twitter: Follow businesses and individuals you are
interested in, don’t be afraid to tag them in some of your tweets occasionally.
Facebook: Populate the “About” section with your
skill and education portfolio to optimize your professional appeal.
LinkedIn: Connect to people who have careers you
are interested in, and search who have a degree or diploma that is similar or
related to what your pursued in school. Try to get recommendations and
endorsements from friends.
Your Phone: Remove that weird ring-back tone you have
set-up in your tone. Surely, no one can take you seriously if your ring-back
tone is FUNDAMENTOZ song…think about it.
#Rule 3: Being
ashamed of telling people that you’re looking for a job
Long gone are the days
when you would rely on the newspaper to access job vacancy announcements. Nowadays,
most companies prefer to hire on a referral basis. Some companies actually
approach some of their best employees requesting them to refer the right people
for various jobs.
Woe unto you if you
are lone-ranger. Our advice: Join the right groups in school, join
organizations such as Aisec, inculcate the good habit of attending public
career fairs etcetera. In other words, don’t leave any stone unturned in your
job search efforts.
#Rule 4: Expecting
an insanely huge salary
As a graduate and a
person who doesn’t have lots of skills hands-on skills, it would be rather
unrealistic to hope to find a job that pays you a 6 figure salary…unless you’re
veeery lucky! Most jobs that you’ll come across might be offering a median
starting gross salary in the range of Ksh30,000 and
Ksh50,000.
Of course, you could
be expecting better pay for your skills, but kindly be ready to start
small. As the old saying goes “a bird in hand is worth two in the bush.”
#Rule 5: Using one
CV to apply for multiple job openings
Each time Kuza
Biashara advertises job vacancies, we receive numerous CVs. We recently placed
an ad on one of the local job search sites and believe you me, we were able to
collect more than 1,000 CVs in less than 48 hours! But the large number of CVs
was not actually the problem.
Poorly written,
generic, flat CVs comprised
90% of what we received. Since we don’t want you to repeat the same mistakes
you might have made when applying for a previous job post, we would like to
encourage you to follow these quick CV writing tips:
- Your CV (as a fresh graduate) should not
exceed 1 page on an A4 sized piece of paper. At most,
take it to 1 and a half pages.
- Don’t use one CV to apply for multiple job
openings. Make a point of writing a unique resume for each and every application
made.
- Research about the employer (organization,
company or individual) and use your CV to intelligently show that you are
aware about the business of the company.
- Put the skills that matter to the
potential employer first. For example if you are applying to work as a
customer care rep in a telecommunication firm make sure you place special
emphasis on your “Good communication skills”, “IT skills” etcetera.
Provide links to some of your current/past work/achievements as well.
- Place minimal emphasis on: Your Gender,
Religion, Village Background, Kindergarten education, KCPE grades and your
many roles as a class prefect – unless the employer insists on you
providing such details.
There are many more
tips about CV writing that are there for you to learn.
#Rule 6: Looking
for a job to please your village-mates or relatives
Most of us come out of
campus dreaming of working for one of those “BIG” companies.
Perhaps you want your village mates to respect you because you have landed a
job in Nairobi. Well, while working for a big company based in Nairobi may be a
good idea, finding a job in one such organization might be a far-fetched dream
(in 90% of the cases).
Small and Medium
Enterprises provide employment for 90% of the Kenyan workforce, only 10% gets
to work for the Government and multinational companies. It therefore means that
your probability of securing employment when looking for an SME job is 9 times
higher than when seeking government or multinational company jobs.
Looking for work in an
SME organization will bolster your chances of landing your first job.